Runaway Part 2
by AlessNox
Summary: Overwhelmed by the decision to chose between Sherlock and Mary, John runs away from home to the only person who will help him, his sister Harry. But can the two of them stay hidden when the worlds greatest detective is chasing them? Part 2 of Runaway
1. The runaway pact

There was one thing that Doctor John Watson was good at knowing, and that was when he was about to explode. He had a temper that was worse than most, in fact it was bloody awful, but he made sure that no one saw it because before the overwhelming need to pull out a gun and shoot someone neatly between the eyes overtook him, he would put on his coat and walk away. Taking a moment to cool down had saved him many embarrassments and possible murder sentences.

He knew that now his home would be safer without him there. Murder, rape, strangulation, all of these things passed through his mind. It made him angry, their expectations. The way that Mary had stared at him with eyes that cut like knives while smiling at the guests and passing out Christmas punch. Sherlock with too little desire and Mycroft with too much, not to mention Molly, still pining after all of these years. He walked alone through the streets of London, finally settling on a lonely park bench to review his options. They were few.

Mary was his wife, a beautiful, loving, compassionate woman who had given him more than he had any right to ask for. She had also given him a look that conveyed more guilt than he had felt since looking down at the face of a dead afghan child soldier that he had killed. One of the stories that he still, despite their marriage and long courtship, had never told her about, and never would.

Sherlock Holmes was his best friend and lately his lover. He had dreamed...(God what fantastic dreams they were!) of Sherlock admitting his undying love; Of them living happily ever after; White tuxedos and domestic bliss, but then reality had kicked in. Sherlock's callous remark about coffee had put a damper on those thoughts, forcing him to remember that Sherlock Holmes was still Sherlock Holmes: Brilliant, beautiful, thoughtless.

John had built his life around Sherlock and Mary. What life did John have without them? What good was an unemployed former doctor, former detective, former soldier? John had left Sherlock to make a life of his own, but what kind of life had he made for himself? Not much of one, actually. It was time for some hard thinking about who he was and what he wanted out of life, but if he spent another minute sitting on this darned park bench, then he would be frozen to it. John stood up and started to walk again.

The people streamed around him, eagerly getting in some last minute shopping before the stores closed. Listening to the Christmas music spilling out of storefronts lit by fairy lights as he walked among streets full of happy people rushing home to their happy wives and happy lovers made John wish that he could torch the city and burn it to the ground. He couldn't go home, but where else could he go? Who else would take him in? Who would accept this darker side of himself? Not Mike. Not Greg. Then he realized, there had really been only one choice after all.

John walked up to the wooden door and stared at it. His feet were freezing. His cheeks felt like rock. He knew that it was warm inside, but he was still hesitant to knock on the door of the flat that he hadn't entered in over a year. But home wasn't an option now. Neither was 221B Baker street. He knocked.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

The sound of loud voices and music filtered through the door.

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

Footsteps and chatter and then the door opened to reveal a woman: Big shouldered, red hair (dyed), nose ring, pierced lip, and a shocked expression. "Hello Harry," John said.

"Oh, why are you here?"

John frowned. "Nice to see you too sis. Can I come in?"

Harry looked over her shoulder and then lowered her voice. "I'm entertaining, if you understand my meaning. Can you come back tomorrow?"

"No."

Harry looked puzzled and then stepped back, looking John over from head to toe. "Mary finally kicked you out didn't she? I knew that couldn't last."

John's anger flared. "No she didn't. Damn it! I'm your brother let me in before I freeze to death!"

Harry crossed her arms and glared at him. "You haven't visited, called, or written since the wedding, so tell me one good reason that I should feel compelled to give up a pleasant evening to deal with one of your tantrums?"

John stood at attention and licked his lips nervously before he said. "I've come to evoke The Runaway Pact."

Harry's mouth fell open, and she laughed. Then she stood aside and let him in.


	2. Hanging with Harry

John sat nursing a bottle of beer at a quiet table, or as close to a quiet table as was possible in the bar where Harry had taken them. The room was dark except for the red and purple glare from neon beer signs and the glow of television screens. Harry sat across from him with her friend Jazz. A young woman with long hair that changed color from red to blue to black. She smiled at him. "So this is your brother. Well, he don't look so bad."

"Back off Jazz, he's an awful stick in the mud." Harry commented taking another swig of beer. "Besides that, he's gay."

"I am not gay."

"Yes you are. I can't believe it. You evoking the runaway pact. I guess that the honeymoon is over."

"Wait a sec," Jazz asked. "Can somebody explain to me this 'runaway pact' thing."

Harry laughed, "It was something we came up with as kids. Mom and Dad were in this bad place, and it wasn't fun being at home, so Johnny here got the idea to move into this nearby abandoned building and live there, but he was afraid that our parents would find him, so he made me agree to this pact."

"Don't act like it's all my idea. You were part of this too."

"I'm not saying anything bad about you. Hell, you are so sensitive!" Harry yelled at him before turning back to Jazz. "Well, we agreed that when the pact was evoked the other would swear to help the runaway in whatever way was necessary without giving away his or her location to the person or persons that he or she was running from."

"So did you ever use this pact Harry?"

"You bet she did," John replied. "Lots of times, but this is only the second time I've ever evoked it. So Harry. Will you do it? Will you help me?"

Harry looked at her brother and fiddled with the bead on her pierced lip. Then she smiled. "Of course I'll help you brother, but on one condition."

"What's that?"

"Tell me who you are running from and why?"

John looked down and then rubbed the back of his close shaved hair with one hand. "I'm in a sort of a situation, a romantic situation, and I need to get away to think about it."

"Romantic?" Jazz asked. "Didn't you say that he just got married?"

Harry smirked. "It's because he married a girl, but he's gay."

"I am not gay,"

"Well a little bird told me that they saw John Watson kissing another bloke under a bridge. It took me exactly one guess to figure out who it was." Harry laughed. "So love triangle is it? This is so rich!"

"It's not funny."

"Isn't it?" she said. "The only reason that you're having trouble with your wife is because of another man. I said it a million times. You are gay."

"I am NOT gay!" John yelled and then looked around nervously as others started to stare.

"Did you kiss Sherlock, or didn't you?"

John rubbed the back of his head nervously. "Well... although I am not gay," John began, "I may be a bit ... bisexual."

Harry laughed even harder. "Oh John, bisexuals are a myth. It's just gay guys who are too repressed to admit it."

"That's not true."

"That is so true, and you are so gay." Harry turned to Jazz, "Look at that shirt. See how he wears it loose. Lookin' like he just threw on something he had lying around the house and didn't have time to button it up. I've seen him spend hours in front of the mirror trying to make himself look casual. He is such a liar. He acts like he doesn't care how he looks, but he's always getting' those striped shirts and the country doctor jackets. Staring at himself while adjusting his tie." Harry moved her hand back and forth under her throat, "You wouldn't know it to look at him, but he is vain, so yes John, you are gay."

"Well this argument is getting old. So let me tell you the problem. This is going to be harder than just letting me crash in your flat."

"And why is that?"

"Because they'll probably come looking for me, and nobody is as good at finding things as Sherlock Holmes."

"Bloody Hell!" Harry spat.

"Language!" John said.

Harry stood up so straight that she almost rose out of her chair. "So you're still trying to lecture me? My perfect brother who is two-timing his beautiful new bride with his old flatmate?"

"I would have expected a little sympathy from my own sister."

"Like the sympathy you gave me when Clara and I broke up? I don't think you want to bring that up now do you?"

John turned away then and grasped the neck of the bottle without taking a sip. "So will you help me, or not?" he asked.  
"I told you I would. But this is going to require help. We need to find someone who is clever, has resources, and is good at disguising men. That means we need to see..."

"Brandywine!" Harry and Jazz said together.

"What's Brandywine?" John asked.


	3. Brandywine

John stood, hands in pockets, in an unimpressive street in front of a nondescript door set apart from its neighbors by a purple light. "Are you sure that this is the place?" he asked. "It doesn't look like a bar. It looks closed."

"The light is on, and it's not that late. If you hadn't wasted all of that time dithering in front of the post office we would have been here sooner," Harry said as she and Jazz led the way in. John followed.

The entry was dark, but it opened out into a cabaret set with round candle-lit tables surrounding a stage. A tall woman with pink hair and a red dress was singing a love song. She moved with the music in a way that set off her narrow hips, too narrow. John looked again. Suddenly he understood what Harry and Jazz had been joking about all of the way here, about how he would become 'a new man'.

He looked around for a quiet table in the back only to find most of them already taken, mostly by single men, but some by couples. John stared at one couple wondering if they were really a man and a woman as he had first thought, before Harry chided him for being rude. She pulled him to a table closer to the stage.

John looked down at the scarf-covered table. He picked up a purple matchbook that said _Brandywine_. This was the sort of place where they still printed matchbooks even though smoking indoors was now against the law. John wondered what people used the matches for. Burning evidence perhaps?

Suddenly John felt eyes watching him and he looked up to see a tall woman (man?) towering over him. She had black hair piled up in a bouffant hair-do and was wearing a blue sequined floor-length dress. Her make-up covered face made her look dramatic and fairly beautiful.

"Brandywine!" Harry said reaching out a hand to her which she took in both of hers, smiling.

"Harry darling, and Jazz," she said in a deep sensuous voice, "So good to see you again so soon. And who is this incredibly handsome young man?"

"I'm not that young. I'm certainly no younger than you," John said.

"Oh I like him," Brandywine said extending a manicured hand.

"This is my brother, John Watson. John, this is Brandywine," Harry introduced them.

"Pleased to meet you," John said reaching out to shake her hand.

She took his hand and clasped it between both of hers before sitting down in the chair next to him. John jumped up to adjust her chair, and she smiled broadly. "I must say Harry, you have the most charming brother. Why did you never bring him before?"

"Well, My brother and I don't often socialize together," Harry said, "You see..."

"Harry!" John interrupted knowing what she was about to say.

"I was just going to say that we needed her help," Harry said kicking him below the table.

Brandywine looked back and forth between the two of them. "My help? How can I help you?"

"Well," Harry said leaning forward and lowering her voice," he wants to get away for a while, but he will very likely be followed. He needs to not be recognized, you understand?"

Brandywine flashed an enigmatic smile and then batted her large lashes at John. Just then the stage lights dimmed and when they came up again, there was a white-faced figure covered by a large billowy black hooded robe. The face was white and as perfectly formed as a mask. She stood still for a second, sure that all eyes in the room were on her before she dropped the robe to reveal a strapless white floor length gown. John had to look twice to make sure than she was a man. But the shoulders were a bit too straight and was that shadow chest hair?

John felt a touch on the back of his hand. He turned to look into Brandywine's dark eyes,"The art of the female impersonator is the art of illusion," she said leaning over to whisper in his ear. "You may think that the best female impersonators are those that look most like women, but you would be wrong. The best impersonators always have a tell-tell hint that makes you suspect that she is not. You wonder _'is she or isn't she?'_ It is the ambiguity that makes her so alluring. That makes her not just male or female, but a goddess. It's a powerful feeling. Once you've tried it, it's hard to give up.

"I don't want to be..." John began but Brandywine hushed him with a finger on her burgundy colored lips.

She turned to Harry. "I can't do anything without interviewing him first." She raised a hand, and a waiter materialized at her side. "Give these fine, young ladies a drink on me will you Rae? I'm going to take John here to my office."

Brandywine rose from her chair and reached out her hand to grasp John's. He took it and she sashayed out of the room pulling him behind her. More than one set of eyes followed them as they passed.

A man in a silver dress and high heels rushed out of a dressing room and asked another man if he had seen his razor. When they had left, John turned around to see Brandywine standing before an open door. She motioned for him to go inside.

John didn't know exactly what he was expecting. A pink upholstered couch and lace curtains perhaps, but not the plain rectangular business office with the wooden desk and the green fake leather chair. She closed the door. "Take a seat John," she said lowering herself behind the desk.

John looked around the office. The walls were covered with framed posters of her glory days as a headliner. There were also pictures of Brandywine standing next to celebrities and dignitaries that showed that she was quite a bit older than John had thought. She had really aged well. "So John," she began, "you need to get away. Why?"

John puckered his lips and took a breath, "I have a wife, and a friend who are after me to ...make a decision, and I can't think clearly when either of them are around. I need some time away to think things through. It's confusing. I don't know if you can understand."

"Oh, I think that I do understand you, John. Your problem is not as uncommon as you might think. There are many people out there who have problems with family who don't understand them. Sometimes they even send people after them, to find them, even to hurt them. The world is not kind to people who are different."

"I'm not gay," John said.

"Did I say that you were?" Brandywine countered. "Pardon me. I don't mean to seem nosy, but helping people is not without risk, and I won't do it without a good reason. Tell me about you, John. How do you feel now?"

John sat back in the chair, and then he crossed his arms facing away as he began, "I feel ... like I'm being pulled apart, dissected. Like my emotions are being taken out and examined and some are being thrown away. Like I'm a flag in a storm blowing violently back and forth never knowing where the next breeze will take me, only knowing that it will rip me to shreds. I try to aim for a goal, only to find that my compass is off, and I've missed the destination by miles. I don't know who I am anymore. I don't know who I'm supposed to be, and I can't just keep smiling and pretending that it will all be alright. I just... don't want to feel this way anymore, and I know that neither of them will ever let me go."

John put his head in his hands and sighed, then he sat back and licked his lips nervously. "So, is my reason good enough?" he asked his eyes questioning, "Will you help me?".

Brandywine looked into John's earnest eyes and smiled. "Yes, I'll help you," she said, "for you honey, I'd face them off myself. I could sense your desperation the moment you sat in that chair. I will help you get away, but I want you to consider this. The people who really love you will accept your decisions whatever they are. Maybe not immediately, but eventually."

Brandywine stood and walked around the desk to the door. John jumped up to open the door for her and she smiled at him as she said. "Oh and John, about you not being gay. I have a confession to make." She leaned down to whisper in his ear and said, " I'm not either." Then she adjusted her wig and strode out of the room.


	4. Escape

"What do you think Tam, the brunette or the ginger. I'm leaning toward the ginger," said a man in the silver sequined dress.

"Are you out of your mind?" Tam shrieked, "he's a natural blond, and quite a bombshell he'll make with those delicate features of his, but he's going to need a shave."

In a back room at Brandywine's nightclub, John sat in a chair before a lighted mirror as two men in dresses fussed over him. Harry and Jazz sat in the corner of the room rolling with laughter as they watched.

Tam lifted John's chin. "You should moisturize you know," he said as he smeared shaving cream across John's face. Harry whispered something to Jazz and they broke out laughing. John frowned at them through the mirror. "Now stop that will you! "Tam said, "you'll make me cut your cheek."

"I think you're right about the blond. It goes well with his complexion," Sam said holding a blond wig against John's face as Tam pulled a razor across his chin and above his lip. It had been a long time since someone had shaved him. John closed his eyes and tried to think of it as just another trip to the barber shop. Tam wiped his face with a towel and rubbed it with his finger. "There," he said, " smooth as a baby's bottom."

Sam lifted red lipstick in front of his face. "What about this?"

"Red! Do you want him to look like a slut? No it's baby soft pink for Johnny here. He's going to be a classy lady, not some common harlot." Tam bent over and pulled pink lipstick off of a tray. "Now pucker up, honey."

"I'm going to make a very ugly woman," John said.

"Trust us, you'll have men chasing after you by the time we're done with you."

"So, no change there," John said. Harry lifted an eyebrow and John's chuckle turned to a frown. "I mean, some men will go for anything in a skirt."

"Men like you you mean?" Harry added from the back of the room. John turned in his seat and gave her a cold stare.

An hour later, a John-sized woman stood surrounded by admirers who smiled and whispered among themselves. "He's adorable!" Sam said clapping his hands.

John was wearing beige low-heeled shoes, stockings, a dusky pink A-line dress covered by a flower print queen's-cut jacket. A string of white pearls with matching earrings set off his cute make-up covered face surrounded by a short blond wig whose tips turned in like the best 60s models. He clutched a pink bag to his chest, but it wasn't big enough to hide behind, unfortunately.

"I look ridiculous," John said.

"I am a genius," Tam replied.

Brandywine walked in carrying a Polaroid camera. She snapped a picture of him.

Hey," John said holding up his hands, "No evidence."

"It would truly be a crime if I didn't preserve this moment. You're quite attractive as both a man and a woman. Even more so because you are totally ignorant of your charms. Come with me, and I'll show you the secret way out."

As John walked down the hall, Harry came over to walk beside him. The ginger wig had ended up on her head.

"You look like Mom," John said.

"Stuff it!" Harry spat.

"What are you complaining of? I'm the one in drag."

"Well I'm dressed as a man dressed in drag, so I think I beat you on that count."

"Where's Jazz?"

"She's on another mission," Harry replied as they walked around a corner into a darkened corridor.

Brandywine unlocked a door and led them through it. "Go to the end of that hallway. You'll find a stairwell that exits on a different street. Wait in the doorway until some people pass. It will be harder to recognize you in a crowd."

John turned and grabbed Brandywine by the arm. "Thank You," he said.

"You're welcome," she replied her voice lower and unaffected for once. Then she stepped back into character and waved to them as she passed back through the door, " Don't be a stranger Dr. Watson. A woman like me always appreciates a visit from a gentleman."

The door shut and locked behind them.


End file.
